My Spread in Deb's "Alice" Journal

This is it!!I used a napkin that was too big for the page so I had to tear it up and make a cohesive spread. I also added some ribbon and fibers and glitter pen to finish it off.
Hope you like it Deb.

October 2018: Sharon's Circus Journal proved to be an interesting challenge for me. I had so many ideas many of which preceded me by others I discovered when I received the journal, so I set about creating something quite different and believe I succeeded. Sharon, I hope you like it.

This one is the outside of the A4 sheet which folds over to make a cover. I have not photographed my steps. I collected images from the net and did backgrounds using watercolour and sprays. I wanted it to be dark and moody, as this is no ordinary circus because if you go in, you may not come out.................

Here are some of the interesting characters you may find inside the tents when you enter. There are other interesting characters inside, please come in and see us.........🤡👹👻💀

Destination Egypt

Egypt!
What an mind boggling place, it conjures up so many images and thoughts and is one of our most documented and most studied ancient places- so many ideas were present for Annabelle's amazing travelling art journal. 

We are a homeschooling family and when my lads were little my eldest was obsessed with ancient civilisations, especially Egypt. We had some dear friends spend time there and we followed their journey from home and they bought us home a stack of goodies on their return. I raided some of these for the center of this spread, all of those wonderful places to visit.

One needs hieroglyphs for Egypt  and they are great graphic journal fodder too :) I have no idea what I was talking about up there but I like the way they look.

I also had the lyrics of this old song from Mental as Anything that insisted on being included so I squeezed them in too and my page came together. It is a really fun journal and Annabelle I am sure you will enjoy your journey through it on its return. 

Egypt

Mental As Anything

Egypt, I saw you 

On the television

I saw your name 

Written on a wall

I saw your picture

In a magazine

Egypt, can I ask you 

To lend me your blue sky

And your dreamy

Virginal tenderness

I don't know you very well

But I really like you

Egypt, I'm a gonna 

A, see you soon

Said I'm a gonna walk on 

Your foreshore

Egypt, won't you hold me

Like I held a map of you

I learned your location 

From a travel brochure

Egypt, I need your 

Sophisticated silence

Egypt I'm a gonna

See you soon

I'm a gonna walk on 

Your foreshore

Songwriters: Chris O'doherty

What a Wonderful World by Pam.

This month I have had Lisa's Art Journal, it's theme is Music and Lyrics which really resonates with me.  Music has always been a very important part of my life.  But what song could be said to be my favourite,  There are so many as I have had a lot of years to collect favourites.

Somehow this beautiful song popped into my head and away we went. I got so into it I didn't get many steps photographed.

I started with a coat of gesso and then broke out the Dylusions paint.  I love the combo of yellow, orange and green.  Wiped it on and tried to blend it. Added some stamps and some reverse stencils.

I then set about making my elements.  The leaves are a home made stamp which I embossed, then I stamped some roses, fussy cut and coloured them  And added a butterfly die cut. I printed out some lyrics and added them too.

 Finally I did some outlining and some journalling using more lyrics from the song. I am happy with the result and I hope Lisa is too.

Lisa Playing in Deb's Alice Journal!

I love all things Alice!  So many interesting characters in these books (and movies.)

I decided on a collage, and wanted to add a page or two of the book as well.  I found this double spread online which fit perfectly!  Plus it was free 😊.

Next I drew some characters based on the 2010 movie, on a thinner watercolour paper, watercoloured them, and fussy cut them.

I added some vines to the book pages using some music paper which I then watercoloured.

Finally it was just a matter of adding my elements to the page!

...And then adding just a bit of journalling.  Here's the final page!

Hope you like it Deb! 💗

I Dream of World Peace by Jenny

It sounds so Miss Universe to say that I dream of world peace, but wouldn't it be the most incredible thing ever? I have dreamed of many things (my son's safety and happiness, to sell my art, to live by the sea, be a ballerina or tap dancer, travel the world, have an Old English Sheepdog, and more), but to have world peace would be amazing. So that's what I chose to create inside Robyn's book...

How it started... searched the internet-verse for a globe of our Earth that showed Australia and a dove that matched what the idea in my head looked like. I was going to include an olive branch too but used gold "ribbon" instead as its near Christmas and a bauble felt like a good idea at the time.

Working on watercolour paper, I sketched out the bird, globe's circle and a rough idea on where the words would be drawn. All painting has been done using my Gansai Tambi Watercolour Paints.  The dove was first, using white and a hint of blue for shading.

Once the feathers were dry, I painted in the eye with black.
The Earth's circle was painted only in water first, then while still wet I added dark and light blue with touches of yellow. I love watching paint blend :) As it dried, I touched it up with more of the dark blue to make it more like a sphere.

I cut a circle out of scrap paper and used the outer piece as a mask. Then I could spatter white splats on the Earth without getting it everywhere else. I then gave the bird more shadows and coloured his beak and feet.

Once everything was completely dry, I added the ombre yellow background. To do this I started at the darker edge and blended the yellow with more and more water as it was painted across to the opposite side.

Next was the gold ribbon and clasp for the Earth bauble. I used a beautiful acrylic paint by Finnabair called Dragon's Eye - its a bright gold that shimmers and sparkles!
To create the words "world peace" I used a black calligraphy marker with a chisel tip.

The next day I felt it needed something else, but didn't want to add my usual stamping and stenciling over the background. So I had a wander through my Tim Holtz Stickers and Quote Chips, and used them to add some of my thoughts to the page.

Hope is never lost for dreamers of peace, happiness and love on Earth for all.

Thanks for reading my blog post, I hope it made you smile!

Have a happy day!
:D
Jenny

AAJS6: Sharon's Pages in Roz's Art Nouveau Journal

Hi Everyone

 

I am sharing my pages in Roz's Art Nouveau Journal.

 

 

I have to start out saying I really wasn't aware of the difference between Art "Deco" and Art "Nouveau" until explained to me by Rick St Dennis - a talented artist - if you look him up he has been involved in all sorts of productions in the US and knows about costume design etc. I am on hid digi stamp design team and he provided this gorgeous Art Nouveau woman for me to use and also explained that Art Nouveau is more "organic" and flowing than Art Deco - which was a perfect way to explain because I totally understand now when I look at Deco and Nouveau!!

So I have learnt something with the creation of these pages!!!!

 

 

I started with the standard coat of Gesso LOL!

 

Added some blobs of watercolour paint!

 

 

Spritzed the blobs with water and dragged down the page with a spatula - my favourite tool!!

 

 

I added a floral border stamp by Blank Page Muse to the page edges with archival ink.

 

 

I coloured the digi stamp with Copic markers and fussy cut and printed out the quote on kraft coloured paper.

 

Adhered all the elements to the pages and it is all done!!

 

 

I tried to keep the colours "organic" and natural looking - not too bright and the pages flowing.

I'm happy with how it turned out!

 

 

Sharon :)

Annabelle works in Colleen’s journal

I always love working with napkins so I had fun playing in this journal so much so I forgot to take process pictures along the way. 

I have been trying hard not to do faces in everyone’s journal but I could not resist the urge this time. I hope you like her Colleen, I am so sorry that my photo of the finished page is so poor.

Pam’s journal

These words of wisdom were given to me by my grandmother,
who I always thought was a very wise old lady. 

I am sure she didn’t think them up but I don’t know who said them first, so I can’t give them credit. 

It was a lovely journal to work in, so I hope you like it Pam

Robyn’s journal

I have always fantasised about growing wings and flying! 

Thanks Robyn for being able to bring that fantasy to life, it was fun! 

I am sorry I didn’t take more photos but I get in the zone

 and before I realised I had finished it

Annabelle's Art Nouveau

I had to do a bit of research for Roz’s journal 

and I am not sure I got the style right

 but I had fun working in it anyway. 

I hope you don’t mind Roz if it’s not quite art nouveau.

 Here are my process pics. 

I sketched my girl, spent some time trying to get the hair right 😊

Then I added collage and finally the words.

Art Nouveau in Watercolour

Researching what to create inside Roz's beautiful book was fun ... there are so many Art Nouveau artworks that are perfect for turning into an art journal - Tiffany glass, sculptures, oil paintings, posters and advertising were just some of what I found. I'm sure you've all thought the same - "oh wow, where do I start?". 

You can only um and arr so many times! I decided to recreate something by Théophile Alexandre Steinlen (November 10, 1859 – December 13, 1923). He's the artist who painted and designed the famous "Le Chat Noir" posters. Love that cat! Théophile painted a beautiful rooster too (which I almost used) but in the end I chose his "Lait pur Sterilise" poster. I love the cats in this poster, they have purrfectly happy faces!

Just a few of Théophile's cats found in Google.

I took a few photos of how it all came about, but really, all I did was trace a picture, colour it in with paints then outline it all with black pen and grey marker. Took ages and lots of waiting for layers to dry but its such a simple technique, especially when you're working with solid colours. 

I used a lightbox to trace the design including the lettering. Always feels like cheating when I do this, but drawing people is not my best thing, and each time I drew her face, she ended up like a little old lady glaring at the cats.

The first layer I used pale yellow and yellow ochre with a hint of red to warm up the yellow ochre then left it to dry. Next was the hair and dress... 

Watercolour isn't a very forgiving medium and I almost started again a few times. Black outlines can cover up a multitude of errors! lol :) It also helps reminding yourself "its fine, its art, there are no mistakes in art!"

It wasn't until I'd finished the cats that I was happy with it... they're wonderful animals and Théophile captured their eagerness really well. They were a pleasure to draw and paint.

All outlining finished and drying, onto the words... after all, it is a poster!

I traced the lettering too, putting the "de la Vingeanne" under the main tagline instead - just a bit of artistic license! My version is all about the cats and girl so left off the wording under her dress and the fawn background.

Lastly, I added marks and speckles using grey felt tipped pen. I traced the artist's name in red pencil, then added my name with his as well, pretty sure he won't mind! lol :)

All finished, trimmed, folded and stuck inside Roz's book :) Phew, well planned - no cat has his head folded in half! Its like packing toy animals in a box for moving house... you can tell which box they're in by the air holes or nose sticking out of the box gaps!

I've named the cats (left to right) : Sammy (my Nanna's orange tabby cat), Steri (my wild black cat) and Krystal (our current cat).

In case you're wondering, its an advert for Vingeanne, a milk company who sterilised milk and claimed it was still so fresh and pure even cats want it to drink.

Thanks for checking out my painting for Roz :)

Have a wonderful creative weekend!

:)

Jenny